sail_ooc | TEST DRIVE MEME #5

1. not subtle revealings

[you wake up.

it doesn't matter where you were before. going to bed? dying? opening the door to face a great evil? same result. you wake up in a soft bed with starched sheets in a cool, darkened room, sunlight peeking out from behind thick curtains. maybe you're alone; maybe you aren't. maybe you immediately notice the folded paper on the bedside table near your head. if you don't, you better fix that real quick: you won't be able to even open the door before you read it.

the note itself is written in a neat hand on white card stock; there is a stylized logo of a ship with the words SERENA ETERNA printed underneath. the note reads as follows:

Dear Passenger(s),

As your cruise director, it is my great honor to welcome you aboard the Serena Eterna, your destination for fun and adventure! We know you could have chosen any cruise line for your vacation, and we're very grateful you chose ours! On behalf of the Captain, I would like to assure each and every passenger that will we do whatever it takes to fulfill all your needs and desires during your journey with us.

At your earliest possible convenience, please attend the mandatory lifeboat drill by the end of the day. I'm sure everyone is very eager to get started on all the fun and sun, but safety always comes first! You can find your life jacket in your cabin's closet; carry it to your assigned muster station on deck one, where I will take you through the drill. If you can't find me in the crowd, just look for the gal with the winning smile!

See You Real Soon!

Sincerely,
Gal Friday

you walk to deck one. you have no other choice: every time you try to step in a direction some unseen being considers "not towards deck one," you find your legs no longer move, staying stock still, frozen. whether compelled quickly by curiosity, or delayed by pure stubbornness, the result is the same, and you are left milling around with other similarly curious or stubborn people.

you see someone in uniform near the front of the crowd. she seems to be a gal, but is missing the winning smile, along with most of her other features. she seems to see you, though, rushing to your side and placing a lei around your neck with great formality. a voice, cheery but artificial, sees to come from nowhere and everywhere.]

Welcome! I'm very glad to have you aboard!

[you touch the lei. rooster feathers, lotus seeds, and a carved circle of something white and hard, linked onto a silk string.

after the drill is completed, you are seemingly free to go. or, well, your legs work, now. and maybe that's as good as it's gonna get.]

2. a permanent reminder of a temporary feeling

[the reflections are missing. all of them. in mirrors. in television screens. on the backs of spoons. nothing looks back at you.

then, figures do show up. not your own, like you'd expect. thin, wispy apparitions, people with pleading eyes and hands, reaching out to place their palms against the surface, from their own end. faces familiar and not, beckoning, mouthing words you just can't quite make out. help me, it might be. get me out, perhaps. just until you're close enough, until your skin warms the surface of whatever it is you're peering into. and then, those same hands wrap, all too real, burning-cold against your flesh, and pull, trying to drag you through the surface, making up for their lack of strength with desperation. any flesh unlucky enough to enter the reflection comes back bone-white and cold, all sensation dead, though it will fade within a few hours.

in retrospect, it looks a bit more like they were saying something different. something more like, better you than me. or maybe it's not even words at all. they look a bit more like they're laughing.]

3. complex mementos

[but, hey. sometimes changes are good! like, today, in Playback, there's a brand-new game available for all the children to play! it's an old-fashioned sort of claw machine, the type that's so large, a particularly dedicated kindergartner could wriggle their way inside. the prizes vary, and sit loose: bags of candy, stuffed toys, firearms, painfully early-00s electronics, actually that one just looks like a dead iguana, tiny ship-branded knickknacks... like all the other games in the arcade, the game starts up automatically upon being touched; lack of quarters shouldn't keep you from having fun! pro tip: they are loaded, and they will go off if you suck at claw games and let it fall.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Well, maybe the finger thing is contagious," Vala argues, looking more at him than at where they're walking to. She's well accustomed to be tolerated.

"And I wouldn't really be doing my duty if I didn't make sure that we weren't all going to murdered by ghost-spoons. And then there's the matter of you looking more or less exactly like my teammate, except much more baby-faced and side-burns-y, and how exactly does that make sense? I mean, is it an alternate timeline? A clone thing? A brainwashing thing? A long-lost twin you never knew you had?"

She's showing no signs of stopping. Who needs an entertainment deck with her around?

"Oooh, like this movie I saw on Earth once, where these two girls find out they're twins, and they make a whole scheme get their biological parents back together. What if it's like that? I wouldn't want to miss that, would you?"

"I'm pretty sure it was less about the spoon and more about the reflection. Have you tried looking in a mirror this week?" He's not buying the contagion idea. Besides, she already touched him.

"So, I look like a teammate? What do you and your team do again?" If he's stuck with her, he may as well get some more of the facts.

"Unless you're also cold-blooded, I doubt it's a case of memory wipe or twins. No one's reenacting the Parent Trap here." Yes, he's seen it. Yes, he liked it.

"My money is on alternate realities. I've already been cloned and twinned. I think I'd know if it happened again."

Do you think she would look like this if she hadn't been looking in a mirror? ...Well, alright, so she's still very fresh and is still on her run-around of trying to figure out where everything is.

She's glad that he's a) seen the Parent Trap, and b) isn't clueless about weird stuff like that happening. That's helpful! Perhaps she can count on him a tiny bit. Well, not count on, exactly. More like they can be mutually beneficial to each other.

"Well, for one thing, we sometimes to go alternate realities," she answers, once he's done talking. "Although, not me personally, but I've read the reports." Well, she's heard the reports retold to her. Close enough.

He stops short and whips his head around to look at her. "Hold on. You people go to other realities? On purpose?"

"Well... Purpose might be a bit of an exaggeration," she answers, ending up stopping two steps after him and turning to face him. "Mostly we go to other planets, but you know, sometimes things happen. You know, aliens, other galaxies, time travel, dragons... Dragons are a big thing on Earth, right?"

"Dragons are a myth on Earth, unless you have some news for me on that one." No. Focus. Dragons aren't the important part here.

"How are you traveling to different planets and times and realities? Be specific."

"Oh! Stargate," she answers, matter-of-fact. But she does assume he doesn't actually know what that is. "Huge round thing, opens up a portal to other Stargates, placed on planets - or ships, or in space, or wherever - all around the galaxy. Built by a snooty, boring race called the Ancients, millions of years ago, before they all ascended to a higher plane of existence to sit around and watch everything, doing nothing but judge us. But hey, at least they left the Stargates for us to use, right?" Specific enough?

"The Ancients." He puts a hand to his head and stumbles sideways into the wall, leaning on it for support. The peril of his finger is long-forgotten with this new revelation.

"I've met them. Hell, I just had one pay me a personal visit to deliberate over whether he should kill me or not." The jury is still out on that one, maybe.

"What you're talking about is wormhole technology. It was supposed to be protected. No one was supposed to get their hands on it. But in your reality they're letting you used it?"

Well, that's not a reaction she was expecting. And those Ancients really don't sound like her Ancients.

"Yes, well, they're sort of 'letting' just about anything happen," she answers. "They're all..." Get ready for a bad impression. "'Oh, your galaxy is getting obliterated, and you want us to use our immense power to stop it? Tough shit, honeybuns,'" she says, making herself all pompous. "It's a whole thing. Actually, they would never say that, because even saying something is considered interfering."

He is extremely conflicted on how to feel about the impression and it shows in the way his nose scrunches. But at least he's managed to push back off from the wall to face her.

"Yeah... looks like that's another same but different variation between us. The Ancient I met was searching for a new home world because theirs is dying. They aren't in a position to help anyone right now."

She's not actually sure what he's so worried about. The Stargates have been in use for thousands of years, right? It's not really a bad thing.

"Home world?" she asks with a curious frown.

"Yeah. Only reason I bumped into them is because they were considering Earth as a possible new planet to settle on. But, uh, after meeting me they changed their minds about that." they got one look at the way most humans would react to meeting an alien species and decided that was never going to work.

"Oh, right. Well, you see, the Alterans don't even have bodies in my world. Like I said, they ascended to a higher plane of existence. They're like... energy ghosts now. They don't need a home world," she explains patiently (or at least as patient as Vala gets). "I don't think they're the same."

"Oh. That kind of higher plane." So much for the same but different theory. So, where does that leave them?

"Nope. Sure sounds like they aren't. I guess a name like 'Ancients' is a little cliche, huh?"

Okay, back to walking. It feels easier to digest all of this if he keeps moving.

"For the record, technology like what you're describing is the most sought-after weapon in my entire universe, that I'm aware of. There are some nasty people willing to do anything to get their paws on it. I'd maybe be careful who you tell about it."

TEST DRIVE MEME #5

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